Choosing your career

Graduation season is over. Now it’s time for most new grads to look for work and enter the real world. Some may be fortunate enough to inherit their family business or continue their budding online business/jobs but most would be out in the job market and lining up in job fairs and interviews.

Last week, I read very good articles from Philippine Inquirer about Very common (and very bad) ways to choose a job by Ernie O. Cecilia. It’s a very good article for people who are actively seeking employment. And another article entitled ‘Art of successful career shifting’ by Tita Datu Puangco, is a good read for those who are thinking of switching jobs.

An excerpt from Very Common (and very bad) ways to choose a job by Ernie O.Cecilia of Philippine Daily Inquirer

…never let anybody dictate what career is suited for you. If you let him or her, it’s just like letting a judge sentence you to an imprisonment for 40 years in a career not of your own choosing, perhaps based on needs of the economy. Your preferences, passion, training, inclinations, goals and aspirations are never a factor in the choice. You could end up in two ways. If lucky, you could get your dream job. If not, you’re doomed to 40 years of hard labor or a lifetime of meaningless routine in a dead-end job. Worse, you won’t last 40 years – you could die of career stress, dental diabetes or other lifestyle illnesses while trying to escape from boredom.

Like it or not, there are millions of people who found themselves in jobs they hate because they never really made a good choice. Today, they plod aimlessly as they drag their feet to work, not knowing why they do what they do. Their advocacy is for more holidays. Their wish is that Congress should reduce the workweek to 3 or 4 days, and have as many paternity leaves as there are maternity leaves.

…Be constantly aware of things that stand in your way to finding your dream job. Sometimes, the people you love, and the people who allegedly love you, are often the stumbling blocks that deter you from pursuing the career that’s best for you.

Useful Tips

Know your passion. Life is short. I see no point in doing something you hate to do. Many successful people are happy doing work that makes them happy. Look inside you. What are your interests? What type of work makes you happiest? What were your childhood dreams? Get a job and start a career by pursuing your passion. Of course you must temper you passion with the reality of available jobs. Where possible, don’t compromise. If the job you want does not exist, you can find a way to invent it. If there is no employer that offers the job you want to do, you might just start your own small business. I think it was George Burns who said, “I’d rather be a failure at something I enjoy than a success at something I hate.”

Know your competencies. What skills have you learned and developed in school, at work, and at play? The natural tendency for graduates is to pursue a career related to their major in college. Let me disabuse your mind. There is no law that requires you to take a job or start a career related to your major in college. For all we know, you made a wrong choice of your major.

Understand your priorities. A job or career is just another part of your life. Life has several aspects. Understand your priorities in life and focus on them. Often, life asks for trade-offs as you journey. Always know your priorities. Always try to maintain some balance in the many passions that you may have. Life’s journey could mean two steps forward, one step backward. The operative word is “balance.”

Choose your destination. A career is not just a job. Like life, it is a journey. You’re back to the question that once lost its sex appeal for you, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” (My tip: Visualize what you want to be, where you’ll be and what you’ll be doing when you’re 50, 10 years from now, 5 years, or a year from now. It will give you a glimpse of your future…a vision. :))

–end of excerpt

How did I choose my career as an IT practitioner?

When I was young, I remember answering the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” by saying that I want to be a doctor. I can still see the evidence in my grade school yearbook: Mylene’s dream: to be a doctor. However, when I was in high school, I realized I dreaded wearing the lab gown and I didn’t like “inoculating bacteria” or “dissecting a cockroach”. I couldn’t stand it. My microbio teacher would glare at me when I let out a scream when the supposedly dead cockroach starts to move. And I wanted to throw up when I saw moving organisms under the microscope when we placed a sample specimen from the tummy of the cockroach. Ewww!!!

But when it’s time for computer class, I get excited. I especially enjoyed making the sophomore Comp Sci project of the school logo in Turbo Pascal. My project wasn’t that good but my classmates’ projects were awesome. I was fascinated at how they were able to program the colorful lines and circles to move and rotate and form the logo. Oh, I fell in love with computers then.

During my junior year in high school, we were asked to create a mini computer system. I and my two groupmates chose to create a “gatepass” system for our dormitory. A little background: since we came from different parts of Mindanao, we stayed in the girls dormitory inside our campus. We were not allowed to go out during weekdays but we can file a gatepass during weekends if we want to go to the city or go home. The dorm manager has to check our consent forms to know if our parents allow us to go out without a “sundo” or if we are allowed to stay overnight at our friend’s house during the weekend.

Anyway, that project kept me up for many nights. My two groupmates hated comp sci and loved biology so it was a great opportunity for me to work on it. While they focused on working with our thesis partners – rhinoceros beetles larva and green muscardine fungus, I opted to work with the computer most of the time. That’s the time when I felt that I wanted a career with computers. At that time, I badly wanted to be a software developer. So when I was in college, I enrolled in the Information Technology course. My highschool groupmates ended up as a nurse (now working in UAE) and the other one, as a chemistry engineer (in Cagayan de Oro).

I will confess something. When I was in my senior year in high school, I wasn’t very sure of the course I’m going to take up in college. In different colleges/universities that I applied to, I wrote a different course. In UP Dil: Chem Eng’g, UP Los Banos: Applied Math, Ateneo: Comp Sci, MSU-IIT: Statistics. But a week before I enrolled in MSU-IIT, my uncle asked me what subjects I liked in high school. And I answered, Comp Sci and Math. And he told me to enroll in Information Technology. I protested, “Huh? Information Technology? I don’t want to be an encoder! Or a receptionist in some hotel!” Haha. I seriously didn’t have any idea about IT during that time. But when he told me that I’d be working on computer programs and mathematics/logic, I was sold to the idea. And the rest is history.

Am I happy with what I’m doing right now – as an IT practitioner?

Yes. At times, my work can be stressful and sometimes I get the feeling that I still have so much to learn and so many skills to acquire and develop, but at the end of the day, I still feel that I made the right choice. I still lack a lot of skills but I’m betting that this would be easy, knowing that my interest and passion lies in it. :)

Great article ma’am…thanks…very inspiring…God bless with our journey in life and life is a continuous process…until we are fulfilled and be contented…and Life? it’s more of a choice and your 100% intention…if you intend to be what you perceive 10 years from now..it would require 100% intention…to get that 100% results…and mechanism to get that results will just follow…There’s no such thing as “I can’t do it because…”. Thanks ma’am…and continue inspiring others…”I’m one of those”…

Hi Roosevelt! I am really happy to see your comment and my heart leaps with joy to know that I have inspired you. You also left a nice comment, something that will also inspire others who may have a chance to read this. I wish I had more time with you guys. I know you are one of our best products in MSU GenSan. Continue to bless and be a blessing in this world. :)